Yale Sees Hillary Clinton As Alumnus, And Advocate

Hillary Clinton Visits Yale As Alumnus, Husband's Advocate

NEW HAVEN — Friday was Homecoming Day for Hillary Clinton as the wife of the Democratic presidential contender returned to the city and campus where the two lived, studied and met.

The only question was: Which Hillary would New Haven residents see?

Would it be the hard-boiled, domineering radical feminist popularized and vilified by Republicans at their convention this summer in Houston?

Or, would it be the softer, cookie-baking mother of a pre-teen whom some Democratic handlers have sought to portray? As it turned out -- as it often does in this age of spin doctors and image-makers -- the Hillary Clinton who addressed a lunchtime crowd on the New Haven Green and a late-afternoon gathering of Yale Law School students was neither. Instead, what people saw Friday was a relaxed, sociable, well-spoken, advocate for the Democratic ticket.

By her own admission, Hillary Clinton does not fit commonly held stereotypes.

"I'm a lot of different roles and I have a lot of different interests in life," she said in a brief, private interview Friday.

Asked whether campaign staffers have consciously tried to shape and reshape her image to conform to shifting public opinion, Clinton said that isn't so. She is what she is: a powerful lawyer, children's advocate, wife of the Arkansas governor and mother of 12-year-old Chelsea.

"People have found out that I'm a lawyer and a mother and interested in issues," she said. "It's just a natural process of people getting to know me."

Clinton returned to New Haven and the Yale campus Friday, the day before its annual two-day bash known as Reunion Weekend, when alumni meet, greet and party with their former classmates. Clinton is a member of the law school Class of '72.

But the place Clinton visited Friday was very different from the one she knew as a student 20 years ago.

It is a city among the poorest in the nation, where violent crime is rampant in some neighborhoods, where the incidence of AIDS is high, where many residents fear for their safety and where municipal services have been drastically reduced as the result of a shrinking tax base.

Clinton acknowledged the enormity of the city's problems, but attributed them to 12 years of Republican trickle-down economics, which, she said, has concentrated wealth in the hands of a few at the expense of urban America.

"On every front, whatever the problem is, whether it's crime and violence, health care or homelessness or housing, we have deteriorated in the last 12 years," she said.

Because of what she called the administration's "policy of human neglect," city residents, such as those in New Haven, have become largely disconnected and alienated. But, she said, if given a chance, the Democrats' proposals will begin to redress their problems. Clinton said voters are responding to the Democratic message, as evidenced by the people who are flocking to see the Clintons and vice presidential candidate Al Gore at campaign stops across the country.

"I think we are beginning to reach them and crack the cynicism that's out there," she said. "I see it most dramatically among young people, but really among all different kinds of people who feel like they've been left out but want their voices heard again."

Hillary Clinton's homecoming began with a noon rally on the Green where an eclectic group, consisting mostly of Yale students, professionals and street people, had gathered. Police estimated the size of the crowd at 5,000 to 8,000.

They chanted and waved Clinton/Gore and Pro-Choice placards as mounted police patrolled the perimeter of the Green. One woman danced topless through the crowd until some AIDS activists covered her with stragetically placed stickers.

After taking her place on a specially built stage dwarfed by a huge American flag and a sign urging residents to register and vote, Clinton spoke without notes for about 20 minutes.

She repeated many of her husband's themes: the failure of Republican economic policies, the need for a new face in the White House, the plight of the working class, the inability of Bush to plan for the end of the Cold War and the decline of education.

And, she promoted her husband's plans to overhaul the college-loan program, to beef up Head Start and to create millions of new jobs in transportation and environmental technology.

Noting that one-third of New Haven's children live in poverty, she said, "Bill Clinton will care about all of America's children and put their needs first. We need a president who will tell the children of America, `School is work. You aren't doing it for yourselves, you're doing it for America.' "

From the rally, Clinton headed to Wooster Square -- the heart of the city's Italian-American district -- where she visited with an old friend, Harvey Koizim, and was honored at a high-priced fund-raiser at Sally's Apizza Restaurant.